Camouflage

Camouflage is the method which allows an otherwise visible organism or object to remain indiscernible from the surrounding environment. Examples include a tiger's stripes and the battledress of a modern soldier. Camouflage is a form of deception. The word camouflage comes from the French word 'camoufler' meaning 'to disguise'.

Camouflage History Camouflage is derived from the French word camoufler, which means "to blind or veil." Also known as protective concealment, it means to disguise an object, in plain view, for the purpose of concealing it from something or someone. American artist, Abbott Thayer, made an important observation about animals in nature In the late 1800s that became useful in the development of modern camouflage. Thayer noticed many animals had colors that gradually faded from dark on their backs, to almost white on their bellies. This is key to the use of modern camouflage. The graduation from dark to light breaks up an object's surface and makes it harder for one to see it as a single item. An object's three dimensional qualities are lost and it appears flat. Modern camouflage was created in 1915 by the French army. France created a new unit called the camouflage division and artists were some of the first people called in to help develop camouflage during W.W.I.

Camouflage for the Hunter Camouflage is very important for hunting deer. It is not a fashion statement. Its primary purpose is to break up your outline. Deer are twice as likely to detect movement than they are a hunter with no camouflage. For instance, a deer will more likely notice a camouflaged hunter moving in a treestand, than a hunter in regular street clothes sitting still in a treestand. But, this is not to say you should not buy camouflage. It still breaks up your outline and helps you blend in better with your surroundings. For example, camouflage is used to help animals attack their prey. As a hunter you want to be able to hunt and spot deer without them knowing you are there. Camouflage allows you to do just that. To tie the importance of camouflage and movement together, take for example the white-tailed deer. It does not rely on its camouflage alone. Even though it is perfectly camouflaged with the colors, black, white, brown, gray, and reddish brown, it still is easily detected when it moves. As long as a deer stands still or moves ever so slightly, it is virtually invisible. As a hunter, having both camouflage and minimal movement greatly improves your hunting success.

Choosing Camouflage When choosing your camouflage, consider the environment where you hunt most and try to match it to the pattern as best as you can. The most popular patterns are Mossy Oak™ Breakup, Obsession, Realtree™ Hardwoods, Advantage™ Wetlands, MAX-4 and Classic. These patterns are available in our camouflage bedding and as well as baby camo clothes.

Camouflage in nature Camouflage by its very nature is intended for animals to help avoid detection by predators or prey. There are a number of methods of doing so. One is for the animal to blend in with its surroundings, while another is for the animal to disguise itself as something uninteresting or something dangerous.

Camouflaging coloration This is the most common form of camouflage, found to some extent in the majority of species. The simplest way is for an animal to be of a color similar its surroundings. Examples include the

"earth tones" of deer, squirrels, or moles (to match trees or dirt), or the combination of blue skin and white underbelly of sharks (which makes them difficult to detect from both above and below). More complex patterns can be seen in animals such as flounder, moths, and frogs, among many others. • The type of camouflage a species will develop depends on several factors: • The environment in which it lives. This is usually the most important factor. • The physiology and behavior of an animal. Animals with fur need different camouflage than those with feathers or scales. Likewise, animals who live in groups use different camouflage techniques than those that are solitary. • If the animal is preyed upon, then the behavior or characteristics of its predator can influence how the camouflage develops. For example, if the predator is color blind, then the animal will not need to match the color of its surroundings. Animals produce colors in two ways: • Biochromes — natural microscopic pigments that absorb certain wavelengths of light and reflect others, creating a visible color that is targeted towards its primary predator. • Microscopic physical structures, which act like prisms to reflect and scatter light to produce a color that is different from the skin, such as the translucent fur of the Polar Bear, which actually has black skin. Camouflage coloration can change as well. This can be due to just a changing of the seasons, or it can be in response to more rapid environmental changes. For example, the Arctic fox has a white coat in winter, and a brown coat in summer. Mammals and birds require a new fur coat and new set of feathers respectively, but some animals, such as cuttlefish, have deeper-level pigment cells, called chromatophores, that they can control. Other animals such as certain fish species or the nudibranch can actually change their skin coloration by changing their diet. However, the most well-known creature that changes color, the chameleon, usually does not do so for camouflage purposes, but instead to express its mood. Beyond colors, skin patterns are often helpful in camouflage as well. This can be seen in common domestic pets such as tabby cats, but striping overall in other animals such as tigers and zebras help them blend into their environment, the jungle and the grasslands respectively. The latter two provide an interesting example, as one's initial impression might be that their coloration does not match their surroundings at all, but tigers' prey are usually color blind to a certain extent such that they cannot tell the difference between orange and green, and zebras' main predators, lions, are color blind. In the case of zebras, the stripes also blend together so that a herd of zebras looks like one large mass, making it difficult for a lion to pick out any individual zebra. This same concept is used by many striped fish species as well.

Disguise The camouflage technique of disguise is not as common as coloration, but can be found throughout nature as well. Animals may disguise themselves as something uninteresting in the hopes that their predators will ignore them, or as something dangerous so that predators will avoid them. The most famous example of the former is the stick insect, which looks like a stick, as well as its cousin the leaf insect, which looks like a leaf. Disguising oneself as something dangerous is known as mimicry, such as the case of a Scarlet Kingsnake which looks like the poisonous coral snake.

Military camouflage A simple example of common military style camouflage.

Camouflage was not in wide use in early warfare. 19th-century armies tended to use bright colors and bold, impressive designs. These were intended to daunt the enemy, attract recruits, foster unit cohesion, or allow easier identification of units in the fog of war. Smaller, irregular units of scouts in the 18th century were the first to adopt colors in drab shades of brown and green. Major armies retained their color until convinced otherwise. The British in India in 1857 were forced by casualties to dye their red tunics to neutral tones, initially a muddy tan called khaki (from the Urdu word for 'dusty'). White tropical uniforms were dyed by the simple expedient of soaking them in tea. This was only a temporary measure. It became standard in Indian service in the 1880s, but it was not until the Second Boer War that, in 1902, the uniforms of the entire British army were standardized on this dun tone for battledress. Other armies, such as the United States, Russia, Italy, and Germany followed suit either with khaki, or with other colors more suitable for their environments.